Tuesday, April 16, 2013

"Pensees De Paree - Les Surroundings"

When we arrived, we were courteously greeted by the hotel
manager, in a lobby undergoing an upgrade.Artisans applied fake marbling to pillars encircled at their bases with two-inch
bands of fake gold.This latter process
is called “gilting.”I wondered if it’s
called that because they felt “gilty” that it wasn’t real gold.

(CHUCKLING FRENCHILY)Ho-ho-hon.

The walls of our commodious room were handsomely adorned in
an elegant floral- print fabric.Anna
and Colby’s room was adorned exactly the same way.And downstairs in the lounge, once again, the
exact same wall fabric.The hotel owner
must have really liked it.Either that,
or they hated making decisions.

HOTEL OWNER:“Stick it up everywhere.I’m
going to lunch.”(FROM THE FRENCH:“I’ve got a date.”)

Outside, in the Montparnasse district where the hotel was
situated, were rows and rows of apartments (mandated by law to stand no more
than seven stories high), constructed during a massive Parisian refurbishment
in the 1860’s.There were two noticeable
exceptions.One was an entirely
glass-built edifice whose sole saving quality was that it reflected the 1860’s
building across the street, providing onlookers with a view of the good building twice, and the shiny one,
not at all.

Even more incongruous was the area’s single skyscraper,
modern in construction – it was put up in the 70’s – and fifty-nine stories in
height.This was immediately labeled
“The Ugliest Building in Paris.”And not
just by visitors.

On a later “walking tour” of the vicinity, our lively and
informative guide Sophie informed us that Parisians consider the view at the top
of that skyscraper to be the finest view in the city.That is because, when you are standing on the
top of the building, you can’t see it.

Ho ho hon.

(But with the advantage of being true.)

Historical Note.Realizing that the skyscraper marred the otherwise historic homogeneity
of the city, a cap was placed on building heights, leaving only the famed Eiffel Tower and this architectural
misstep to stand out conspicuously on the horizon.

This proved enormously valuable to us throughout our trip,
since, because “The Ugliest Building in Paris” was only two blocks from our
hotel, which nobody including French cab drivers could locate, we could use
this eyesore as a reliable compass point for recalibrating our bearings.We’d be thoroughly lost, turn a corner, and…

“Oh!There’s the
'Ugly Building.’The hotel’s that way!”

And it always was.It’s a good thing about big buildings.They never move them.

A certain family member – she’s a psychologist, so
confidentiality prevents me from exposing her proclivities – enjoys visiting
department stores (and supermarkets) of other places to experience the comparisons
with our own.The “Ugly Building” housed
one of these on its Ground Floor.Its
range of inventory quickly revealed it be the Parisian version of Target.

We bought a tiny t-shirt with the words “Vroom Vroom” on it – baby Milo’s reaction of choice to passing
buses and trucks.

An authentic “Vroom
Vroom” t-shirt from Paris.Pretty
cool, right?Not quite.On our
return, it is explained that our special purchase is a promotional t-shirt from
the 2005 Disney animated feature Cars.

Old news.And American old news at that!

Grandparents.We are
entirely in the dark.

I once insightfully observed that landscape paintings
inevitably reflect the skies of the geographical settings they are painted
in.(How could they not, Earlo?A Dutch landscape artist painting an Italian
sky?How did that happen?“It just
floated in”?I don’t think so.)

As with art, similarly, I became quickly aware, with
music.As I strolled the almost
alley-like back streets of Paris, I could distinctly hear the stirring, barricade-manning
anthems from Les Miz.The evocative rhythms resonated perfectly with the terrain.I almost expected Russell Crowe to
materialize from around the corner and arrest me for some trivial
infraction.Or, even scarier, sing.

During our first day’s casual cobblestoning through history,
I spotted a sign in a long-established brazzerie,
trumpeting the establishment’s possession of “Napoleon’s hat.”I peered in the window, and…

There it was!

My excitement turned to dubiosity concerning how exactly
they knew that the hat was authentic.Was there an inscription in the hatband saying, “Please Return To The
Emperor of France”?And if there was,
why didn’t they? Such are the events that change the course of
history!

NAPOLEON(PONDERING
IN EXILE):“How things might have been
different at Waterloo if I’d only been wearing my ‘Lucky Hat.’”

I am slowly catching up in my history book about Paris.I have finally reached 1704.Hopefully, I will finish before we
leave.The cool part is, we pass a church
built in 1122, and I had read about it two hundred pages ago.

And, of course, forgotten pretty much everything it
said.

But hey…

There it is.

Something I vaguely remember reading about.

Standing there, right before my eyes.------------------------------------------------------------------------------Here's the dilemma: A tragedy occurs resulting from an explosion, and billions are spent on an "anti-terrorism" response. Twenty kids are shot down in Connecticut, and a large sector of our citizenry insist that we do nothing. I really don't get it.